Fry Fest 2012

As most of you know, I LOVE my family.  We are fun, funny and just overall good people.  No bias here though.  I think we are one of those rare families in that in our immediate family, we are super close.  We have our moments but generally we get along.  Throw the cousins in there and it is one big party!
Having a such a strong alliance to University of Illinois in my family, we try to make it to at least one football game a season and "tailgate".  About 4 years ago, my dad had the brilliant idea to bring his deep fryer and literally fry everything!!!  It was then that "Fry Fest" was born!

Fry Daddy!!

My dad does most of the shopping and let me tell you, he absolutely does not hold back.  We have everything from homemade doughnuts to corn corn dogs, toasted ravs and one year, we even tried to deep fry a chicken pot pie!  And of course, there are a couple of turkeys that go and this past Fry Fest, we had a dish of mac and cheese and we decided to ball that up and throw it in as well!!  Along with all of the eating, there is definitely a lot of drinking.  My uncle makes the most amazing bloody mary's so that starts the day off right.  It has become a huge family event now!  Even my cousin from Texas who is at IU now drove over for the day to eat, (not drink) and be Merry!!

Everyone is invited and as the day goes on and the beverages are flowing, we extend to our right and left because a small country could never eat the amount of food we have.  So we offer it up to everyone around us!  We are very popular.  The first couple years, some people actually used to go to the game...this year, no one went.  Let's be honest, who wants to watch that football team when you could be eating friend food, drinking and spending the day with the Rybicki family!!

Seems like a fitting time to take a Christmas Card picutre!!

Not so sober sibling love

We have so much fun it shouldn't be allowed!!  And in all honesty, probably isn't!  Not sure how we have not gotten in trouble before, deep fryers are definitely not allowed.  But we will continue to party hard and eat right until they stop us!  If you are ever up at a U of I game...check out research park and look for the crazies with the deep fryer!  Everyone is welcome.  Maybe one of these years, U of I will be a football team worth watching:)










Until next time my friends!


Eat, Drink and Be Mary!!

Been a LONG TIME!!

Sorry for being SUPER MIA...there is no reason what so ever for it!!  But, I am going to try really hard to make blogging a priority since it is not like I have much else going on right now.

Who is ready for the holidays??  I certainly am!!  There are lots of fun things coming up for me and my family over the next month.  First and foremost, THANKSGIVING!  It is a favorite holiday of the Rybicki family for sure.  I have cousins that are extremely close in age to my sisters, brother and me.  We have pretty much grown up together and I think of them as brothers more than cousins.  As children, we loved our Thanksgiving basketball games.  They were fun and generally ended up with someone in tears...one of the boys most of the time  As we have gotten older, we actually have way more fun!!  We eat at 2 so everyone arrives and my mom and dad's at around 11.  Generally, we started drinking at about 10.  Once we start we never look back!!  Tons of fun and lots of drinking!  There is usually a pretty intense euchre game that one time lead to a full table flip and then this happened last year....

Yes, that is my dad, in the kitchen, with the beer pong table!  After everything was washed, put away, taken back out, re-heated and washed again, we decided it was time for a little family beer pong.  Alas, we realized we had not ping pong balls.  What did we do, all but broke into my best friend's house and searched high and low through her basement while her family was at her grandma's house for the day.  Thank goodness for them never changing their garage code...in my defense, I called first!  It was a family affair and the people who wanted to play but not drink had "designated drinkers".  And to top off all the fun we normally have, my Brother's birthday is on Thanksgiving Day!  The beer, wine, whiskey and vodka will be flowing!  Thankfully, the wee one (my little sister) is a very good mixologist and we have a half barrel in the living room.
After all the fun family time at Thanksgiving, we will get to head up to Champaign to celebrate my niece's FIRST birthday!  I can't believe she is already ONE!!  I love her to death and would do anything for her.  It should be a great day!
I hope everyone else has an amazing start to the holiday season.  If I can offer one piece of advice to everyone, don't get too hammered the night before Thanksgiving.  While it seems like the best decision at the time, take it from someone who spent most of Thanksgiving day yacking or passed out, it's not worth it.  Thanksgiving dinner never tastes as good on the way out as it does on the way in.  And, let's face it, you become the laughing stock of the family until someone else does something really stupid!

Eat, Drink and Be Mary!